


Ghost

by widdlewed



Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Cutting, Dark, Depression, Gen, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, No Ending, Not Beta Read, Not Happy, Poor Sawada Tsunayoshi, References to Depression, Self Confidence Issues, Self-Destruction, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-22
Updated: 2019-01-22
Packaged: 2019-10-14 10:16:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17506685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/widdlewed/pseuds/widdlewed
Summary: It started with a safety pin.It didn't stop there.





	Ghost

**Author's Note:**

> "I tried it once before and I think I might have messed up  
> I struggled with the veins and I guess I didn't bleed enough  
> But maybe I'm alive because I didn't really wanna die  
> But nothing very special ever happens in my life"  
> ~ Ghost by Badflower
> 
> There is description of self-harm in this fic. If this is triggering for you, PLEASE DO NOT READ.

 It started with a safety pin. 

 

He’d been trying to pin up his pants, ripped from a scuffle with bullies that Hibari couldn’t bite to death. He’d been hunched over in the bathroom, biting on his leather belt to muffle his sobs, his body aching. Bruised. Bleeding. 

 

A row of safety pins held a large tear down his thigh closed. Another safety pin moved to clasp the final tatter. His hand shook, slipped. 

 

The sharp prick sunk into his thigh. 

 

Instead of the sudden pinch of pain, nothing. Tsuna reeled back against the stall wall, teeth digging into his belt as he stared at the pinprick of blood forming. The pin itself was buried into the flesh of his thigh, half way sunken. He stared. 

 

It didn't feel like anything. Compared to the throb of his ribs or the constant heat his ankle burned, it was a welcomed distraction. 

 

He wanted more. 

 

It started with a safety pin. 

 

It didn't stop there. 

 

* * *

 

 

He’d drag the safety pin over and over in a line over in a small patch by his hip bone, close to the velvety smooth flesh of his pelvis. He’d drag the line over and over again until the skin broke. It was a tedious process, a slow drag of agony repeated until he was satisfied with the results. 

 

He’d leave the scratches shallow, easy to explain away as a clipped hip on a desk or an unfortunate accident with the neighbor strays. 

 

Not that anyone asked. 

 

His mother didn't bat an eyelash to his tattered, ruined uniforms. Just sew them up, bleach them pristine, and hand them back with a oblivious smile. Tsuna was take them, give a smile that didn't meet his eyes, and continue his routine. 

 

His hipbone was a train-track of scratches and faint cuts, barely bloody or scabbed. Mostly swollen, inflamed and irritated patterns. 

 

No one saw. No one cared to see. 

 

Life continued on.

 

* * *

 

 

Hibari walked in on their class changing one day. The girls had already finished changing for gym class and were heading to the field. The boys were slower, taking time to toss around Tsuna’s PE shorts as if playing a game of keep-away. 

 

Hibari had slammed the door open, tonfas raised in threat. The classroom had frozen, Tsuna’s shorts falling helplessly in front of the prefect’s shoes. 

 

No one spoke. No one moved.

 

Hibari bent down, took the shorts, and glared at Tsuna, who was the only one still in his boxers. 

 

“Everyone out,” he hissed low in his throat and the boys didn't have to be told twice. Tsuna was shoved and knocked out of the way until he was the last one in the classroom. Hibari blocked his exit.

 

“Herbivore,” Hibari snarled low and threw his shorts at the teen, who caught them. Hibari’s eyes trailed down the boy’s flat stomach, stopping on the red, swollen lines peeking out from his waist-line. His tonfa fell to his side, limp. “What are those?” 

 

“What?” Tsuna shoved his shorts on quickly, grabbing for his discarded shirt. He was quick in throwing the long sleeve on, uncaring that it was well in the low 90s that day. He hated showing his weak, flimsy arms. 

 

Hibari marched forward, effectively blocking any chances of Tsuna escaping. He shrunk back, wrapping his arms around his stomach, as if to shield it. 

 

Hibari stored the motion away for later review. He reached forward and tugged the teen’s shirt up, seeing those red lines. Tsuna’s face went slack before paling. He shoved at Hibari, pushing him away from his personal space, and skirted around the teen before he could process being bodily moved. 

 

Tsuna avoided Hibari as best as he could after that.

 

* * *

 

 

Somehow he moved onto razor blades. He didn't know when. Maybe when he found his one pencil sharpener had broken and the razor blade had stabbed into his finger when he reached into his bag? 

 

Maybe. 

 

The lines became a little bit deeper, a little bit redder, a little bit longer. They lasted a week more than his scratches and he had to resort to bandages and cotton swabs to stanch the bleeding. The razor blade brought with it a sting that numbed the pain his body contained. 

 

It was like with each slice, he purged a tiny bit of his sorrow and anguish into the tiny trickles of blood that broke free from his flesh. 

 

His mother didn't ask questions still. She’d have had to spot the blood lining his waistband, spotted from when his bandages chaffed out of place or his cuts were a bit too deep for a thin plaster. She just handed his clean uniforms back to him, smiled that same old smile, and continued with life. 

 

With each cut, each added pale line to his hip bone and pelvis, he felt like he was expelling the dirt in his bloods and in his soul. With each trickle of blood, he imagined the very particles that made him  _ Dame  _ left in the stream, dispelling into the air and forever leaving him a little bit more pure. 

 

A little bit more normal. 

 

* * *

 

 

His mother compares him to his father. His mother compares him to a man he holds no memories of, of a non-existent ghost in their household. She compares his mannerisms, his appearance, his voice, his personality. 

 

She compares and constructs and destroys and it hurts him more than any kick to the stomach or any shove down a flight of stairs. It hurts more than being pinned to a wall and repeated punched in the nose. 

 

It hurts more than the drag of the razor blade over his thighs, fast and messy and uneven as he criss-crosses the lines. His vision spots and he’s on the bathroom floor, sitting in a small but still alarming puddle of blood pooling under his mutilated thigh, and he doesn’t remember ever making the cuts. 

 

The hurt is dulled, just the slightest amount, and he wraps his leg and lets her talk. He’s a good son, despite her words like talons to his heart, and even when she makes him want to curl up and sob, he tells her he loves her. 

 

She hugs him, kisses him, and life continues on. 

 

* * *

 

 

Reborn is a surprising interruption into their peaceful routine. He is loud, he is rude, and he doesn’t understand a single thing about personal space. Tsuna finds his private time cut to null with Reborn in his house, in his life, and his body aches and weighs down on him like a boulder on his chest. 

 

He resorts to quick showers, of using his shaving razor (that he doesn’t need because he had no hair) to make three lines along his thigh quickly. The water turns a pink color and it’s almost beautiful in a depressingly poetic way that reminds Tsuna of those stories of depression. 

 

But Tsuna isn’t depressed. He’s just trying to numb himself to his life. 

 

* * *

 

 

Reborn shoots Tsuna with a Dying Will Bullet and immediately knocks it out after seeing the child’s partially nude form. Scars, fresh and old, litter his hips and pelvis and thighs, peeking from under the hem and waist band of his boxers. Reborn produces a blanket and wraps the child in it, mind reeling. 

 

There was never any mentions of self harm on his reports. Iemitsu never mentioned any mental health issues concerning his child. There was no list of medications, no history of doctors. 

 

Nothing. 

 

Reborn sits with the unconscious child in a secluded street, waiting for him to wake up. Hibari Kyouya shows up, a freshly folded uniform under one arm, and stares down at the slumbering teen. 

 

“He’s gotten worse,” Hibari comments as he hands the clothes to Reborn, not bothering with the inquiring gleam in the baby’s eyes. 

 

“You knew about this?” Reborn asked instead, pulling the blanket back from the teen’s slender form. Hibari helps the hitman dress him, grey eyes cold as they study the cuts. 

 

“They were scratches months ago,” he replied, his tone scathing. “The bullies shouldn’t be bothering him as much anymore.” 

 

“Depression doesn’t always have a source,” Reborn countered and jumped back as Tsuna stirred. Tsuna’s eyes shot open and he’s up with a gasp, hands fumbling with his clothing like he wasn’t expecting any.

 

“We have to talk,” Reborn begins and doesn’t finish before Tsuna is on his feet and down the street. The little shit could run fast when he wanted to, Reborn noted solemnly. 

 

Hibari gave chase. 

 

* * *

 

 

Gokudera doesn’t hurt Tsuna, not the way he was expecting. His words don’t sting and his hands don’t bruise. It’s his eyes that turn into thin lines along his thighs when he has the chance. Reborn makes a show to bursting into his showers now, to catch him in the act. He’s getting good at hiding his lines, at hiding his marks of purging his wrongs. 

 

Gokudera’s eyes are like hot iron prods, searing into his flesh and branding him with his failures at living. He didn't dislike Tsuna for being Dame. He didn't even dislike Tsuna for existing. He disliked him for taking a mantle that wasn’t his, for ignorantly falling head-first into a darkness he wasn’t privy to. 

 

He hated Tsuna not for who he was, but who everyone was trying to make him be, and it hurt in a special way. Tsuna floundered, stumbled, drowning in the ideals and expectations of his peers and the adults in his life. If he was hated for Vongola, what else would he be hated for?

 

Saving Gokudera and befriending him dulled the ache in his chest, just a bit, but not enough to stop a new line from finding home in his inner thigh. 

 

His razors went missing. He switched back to his safety pins. 

 

* * *

 

 

Yamamoto watches him as Tsuna scales the fence-links, placing himself beside his classmate on the ledge. The classmates are screaming, yelling, demanding Yamamoto to move to the safe side. 

 

Gokudera is the only one who screams Tsuna’s name. 

 

“What are you doing?” Yamamoto breathed out, eyes glossy and grip white-knuckles on the links. Tsuna lets his fingers loop loosely through the metal, smile brittle as he leans forward slightly. 

 

Gokudera gives a strangled scream. Yamamoto’s breath caught in his throat. 

 

“It’s a 40 foot drop to the ground,” Tsuna breathlessly revealed, his voice almost a whisper. Yamamoto clung onto his every word. “You’ll feel the impact. You may not even die instantly. It’ll hurt.” 

 

He dreams of it. 

 

“But then it’ll be over.” His head turns to stare at the unforgiving ground and his arm shakes, slackening. Yamamoto grabs his hand, keeping it pinned to the fence. His hand his trembling, too. “It’ll be black. It’ll all stop. No more having to listen to them talk down to you like you can’t understand them.”

 

Yamamoto shifted closer.

 

“No more having to sit there and take their abuse, their jeers, their laughter.” His foot bumps Tsuna’s but brown eyes are dazed, trained on the cement 40 feet below them. He could just lean forward. “No more having to look and see the disappointment on your parent’s face, knowing you aren’t who they want you to be.” 

 

His mother, peering silently at his test reports. He can’t tell her his eyesight his bad and he can’t see the board. He can’t tell her that sometimes the letters get mixed up and he can’t read them properly. He can’t tell her that sometimes the numbers and words just don’t connect in his brain. 

 

He can’t tell her, because his father wasn’t like that at all, and he has to be like his father.

 

Whoever that was. 

 

“It’ll all just stop.” Yamamoto removed his hand from Tsuna’s, instead gripping onto his shirt collar tightly. Tsuna reeled back, bouncing off the links before the fence caved backwards. The two crashed onto their backs on the rooftop and the crowding students surged forward.

 

Tsuna was left staring up at the blue sky as Yamamoto was ripped from his side. Yamamoto struggled, using his good arm to elbow people away from him. His hand reached down and hauled Tsuna up, pulling him to his side. 

 

Tsuna blinked against the white fabric of Yamamoto’s sweat-drenched uniform shirt, smelling the faint scent of his spicy cologne and sunlight in the fibres. Yamamoto held him close, snarling low at the students who got to close. 

 

“Hey, hey Tsuna,” Yamamoto whispered as he ushered them over to Gokudera and Hibari, the prefect baring his teeth at the useless administrators who gawked, “hey. Stay with me, okay?” 

 

Tsuna couldn’t exactly go anywhere with him pinned to the athlete’s side, but he doubted that’s what the teen really meant. 

 

No, Yamamoto was speaking about something else. 

 

* * *

 

 

His mother made a comment. 

 

Something small. Something flippant. Dismissive. 

 

“Why are you like this?” She’d sighed, seemingly spoken her thoughts aloud. Tsuna froze mid-sentence, telling her about his latest set of exams. Beside him, Reborn stiffened and turned beady black eyes to the woman, as if flabbergasted. 

 

“Oh, I’m sorry Tsu-kun, what were you saying?” Nana seemed to notice the stunned silence. Tsuna’s jaw worked opened and closed before he shook his head. 

 

“Excuse me, I need to use the restroom.” 

 

He wasn’t in control of his body. No, he was floating outside of it, watching himself stumble up the stairs and lock himself into his bathroom. He watched himself dig through the supply cabinet under the sink, finding one of his old shaving razors. The blades were beginning to rust from disuse. 

 

He watched himself dismantle the razor to the best of his ability before dragging it deep and long over his thighs. Over and over again. 

 

He watched himself sway, felt his vision blotch and the world shudder under him. No, he was trembling. The world was still, holding his breath, and he gave a watery breath just as the bathroom door exploded into shards of wood and cracked paint. 

 

The tiles were red, so so red, and voices were muffled. His world spun, toppled, and disappeared just as grey eyes watched him fall. 

 

* * *

 

 

Light fluttered in and out of sight. Black crept in. Disappeared into a weird red color. Dyed back to black. 

 

Sobs echoed in his consciousness and he stirred, eyelids fluttering. A drab ceiling. Heavy scent of bleaching chemicals. Cold spreading from his stiff arm. 

 

He blinked. 

 

“Oh my god, Tsuna!” 

 

Yamamoto’s face swam into focus, Gokudera’s pale face and puffy red eyes coming in second. Behind them, Reborn looked up from Nana’s lap. Lurking beside her, Hibari zeroed his gaze in on him. 

 

“Um.” Tsuna blinked, his head feeling like it was filled with cotton. He felt weird. Weightless. Detached. He giggled, trying to move his arms. “Did I do it?”

 

“No,” Reborn answered stiffly. “I found you.”

 

“Oh.” Disappointment crashed through him, grounding him against the clouds he was floating off towards. “Why?” 

 

“Because you can’t do that baby,” Nana sniffled out, moving to his other side. She brushed his bangs back. “You got to stay with me, baby.” 

 

“Why?” Tsuna blinked sluggishly at her. “I thought…”

 

“What sweetie?” Nana smoothed out his creased eyebrow. 

 

“I thought I finally got something right.”

 

* * *

 

 

He stayed in the hospital for a month. He was on constant watch. Hibari had his committee take turns watching him. He made a few friends. Koichi, a third year, liked to sew and made him a stuffed lion. He slept with it each night. Sakamichi, a first year in college, patrolled the school because his baby sister was a first year and had a history of being bullied. He promised to watch after Tsuna. One of the rare girl members painted his nails and took a pen to his arm, drawing out eccentric patterns and vines around his stitches. 

 

He liked her visits the most.

 

Yamamoto and Gokudera became constants in his dull hospital life. It got to the point where the hospital staff didn't even bat eyelashes at the two spending the night with Tsuna. 

 

He almost had to stay longer, after Reborn found him trying to tear his stitches out in a fit of hysteria. Apparently his mother had stopped by an hour before and had thoughtlessly called him ‘no-good’. 

 

Reborn really had to talk to her. 

 

While in the hospital, he met a girl named Nagi. She’d gotten hit by a truck but instead of dying on impact, had merely severed her spinal cord. She was paralyzed but alive, and she called every day a blessing for it. 

 

Tsuna saw the shadows in her eyes though and didn't comment on her lies, and in turn she didn't call him out on his. He had Koichi make her a owl plush and she became his next door-neighbor friend, the two constantly visiting each other’s rooms to chat or cuddle or just lay and get lost in their thoughts. 

 

Nagi had an admirer called Mukuro who apparently saw her save a kitten’s life from the truck. He loved her fearlessness and it became common knowledge that where Nagi was in the hospital, Mukuro was behind her, pushing her wheelchair. 

 

He loved to play with Tsuna’s hair or tease Gokudera. Him and Hibari got banned from the hospital for a week, though, after they nearly caused bloodshed. 

 

The month came and went faster than Tsuna expected and he found himself in his bedroom again. Only another bed was added in revelation that Gokudera had moved into the house after Nana found out he was living in motels.  

 

A wheelchair ramp was installed to their front porch and the guest bedroom was made up for a girl. 

 

Nagi moved in a week after Tsuna was discharged, revealing her parents disowned her for bringing shame to the family name and that Reborn pulled strings to have her move in with them. 

 

Tsuna spent the next three weeks snuggled with both her and Gokudera, squished between the two of them or spooned by Gokudera and in turn cuddling Nagi.

 

And where Nagi went, Mukuro followed, and the Sawada residence gained another family member. 

 

A week later found them all in the living room, Reborn nestled in Tsuna’s lap, running a comforting hand over his wrist. 

 

“Nana,” Reborn spoke seriously, “your words hurt.” They’d all witnessed her thoughtless phrases, her careless slips of the tongue. They’d all witnessed the destruction she unknowingly caused, the hurt she carved into her son’s flesh. “You need to stop belittling your son.”

 

“Wha-what?!” Nana looked horrified. “I’m not! I’m-” her words died as her face fell. “...am I?” 

 

“I don’t like being called useless,” Tsuna whispered. He’d been encouraged by Reborn for  _ weeks  _ to speak his thoughts. He could do this. He could. “I don’t like being called useless or judged or compared to dad. I don’t like - I don’t like how you look at me.” He ducked his head and buried his face into Reborn’s hat. “I don’t like how you don’t love me.”

 

“Don’t-” Nana looked like she’d been physically slapped. “I-I  _ love  _ you, Tsunayoshi!” Tsuna’s head shot up at his full name. “You’re my child! I - I didn't think - oh my god!” She recoiled into herself, staring at Tsuna like she’d just witnessed a murder. “Oh my god, what have I been doing?” 

 

Gokudera rubbed circles along her back while Mukuro and Nagi pressed into Tsuna’s sides. Reborn suggested she talk to Tsuyoshi, who also struggled as a single parent. Nana looked haunted but agreed. 

 

That dull ache that was a constant lifted up. 

 

* * *

 

 

School was weird. No one bothered him anymore. Nagi and Mukuro transferred in, much to Hibari hidden pleasure, and were assigned to his class. Yamamoto and Gokudera switches desks without permission, dragging Nagi and Mukuro in as well, and they formed a square around Tsuna. 

 

He felt safe. Protected. 

 

But it didn't stop that urge to pure his filth from his body. His thighs itches, his hands twitched, and he missed that stinging burn that followed a new scar.  He didn't tell anyone. They’d probably be disappointed in him. 

 

After school, Reborn took him to a doctor. She was a civilian associated with Vongola and she was a psychiatrist. She was nice, her office smelled like vanilla, and she didn't’ judge Tsuna. 

 

Reborn wanted him to meet with her three times a week. 

 

The eight session in, he confessed how he still wanted to hurt himself. She was gentle, helpful, and suggested outlets for him to vent. 

 

The next day, he joined the boxing club and Ryohei unofficially adopted him. 

 

* * *

 

 

He laid in his bed, wrapped up in his comforter. He stared listlessly at the wall, listening to the faint ticking of his hanging clock. 

 

He hadn’t gone to school that day. Hadn’t felt like it. His energy was sapped, sucked away by the trickles of blood he leaked the night before. Mukuro found him, patched him up, and was currently sprawled out in Gokudera’s bed, reading a book aloud in Italian. 

 

“Does it ever get better?” Tsuna whispered softly, interrupting Mukuro’s soothing timbre. Mukuro looked over at him and closed the book, standing up. He was graceful in his stretching and he sat down by Tsuna’s head, letting his hand tangle in the teen’s brown locks. 

 

“Yes. But it gets worse too. It’s an up and down process. You just have to hold out for when it stays up.” Mukuro curled his fingers around the soft strands. “You aren’t alone, Tsunayoshi. We’re here for you.” 

 

Tsuna closed his eyes instead of answering. 

 

He was tired. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> oof I didn't know how to finish his so I just kinda...stopped lmao 
> 
> depression and self-harm are very serious things. Please don't hesitate to talk to someone if you are struggling! You are not alone!


End file.
